Uniting and Building Movements

Van Jones is founding president of Green For All and a contributing editor to YES! Magazine.

Bringing Social Justice and Environmentalism Together

Van Jones has been a critical bridge between the environmental and social justice worlds through his call for green collar jobs. In this interview, conducted on November 12, 2008, I asked him what it was like for him to act as that bridge.

But this interview, which will appear in full in the Spring issue of YES! Magazine, shows Van’s leadership extends far beyond a single issue.

In November 2004, as the progressive world was in deep mourning after the close re-election victory of President George W. Bush, YES! published a lead article by Van in the Healing and Resistance issue that turned out to be extraordinarily prescient. Van showed what we had won during the build-up to the election, and showed how a progressive shift was on the way—or could be.

He later agreed to become a YES! contributing editor, and has written for us on such important topics as rebuilding after Katrina, forming common cause across black and brown, and the movement to stop the destruction of an urban farm in South Central Los Angeles.